"I have a question for you:What % of transitional versus non-transitional forms are fossilized?

Is there some difference that makes the transitional forms more resistant to fossilization than their non-transitional counterparts?"

Does this make sense? The only thing that distinguishes transitional vs non-transitional is order of find, isn't it? A fossil is a fossil; if you find two and then later find a third that seems to be a transition between them, that doesn't make them different as far as fossilization, just how the third fits into the already existing collection. Or am I missing something?

I'm sure he understood the process of fossilization and I've seen his data (although I'm surprised with the amount of life that's inhabited the planet compared to the number of fossils, he would be so shocked to see gaps in the fossil record. I guess he wanted a poster child for the transition). He could have spent 250 pages and it still wouldn't make a difference, this is not 1950. He used the evidence that he had at the time to construct an argument and made a case. Now we have something like this:And here

The saltational events that Schindewolf proposed would go where the dotted lines are on your chart - the part subtitled "suggested lines of descent".

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Do you mean "archetypes" like he writes on page 411? As he says: "In contrast, we stay with the objective natural data and strive to arrange the morphological steps in the system in their natural sequence." So let's look at fossils that have been discovered since 1950: how about the Therapsid-Mammal transition, are they far enough apart? Try Colbert and Morales (1991) or Strahler(1987). Reptile-Amphibian? Try here. Fish-Amphibian? Try here!

I don't have the book in front of me right now, so I'll have to get back to you on that.

--------------"If we all worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true is really true, there would be little hope of advance." Orville Wright

"The presence or absence of a creative super-intelligence is unequivocally a scientific question." Richard Dawkins

You do that Daniel don't take too long...or change the subject *Snicker*.

--------------The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

We are very lucky to have fossils at all. After an animal dies many conditions have to be met if it is to become a fossil, and one or other of those conditions usually is not met. Personally, I would consider it an honor to be fossilized but I don't have much hope of it. If all the creatures which had ever lived had in fact been fossilized we would be wading knee deep in fossils. The world would be filled with fossils. Perhaps it is just as well that it hasn't happened that way.

Because it is particularly difficult for an animal without a hard skeleton to be fossilized, most of the fossils we find are of animals with hard skeletons - vertebrates with bones, mollusks with their shells, arthropods with their external skeleton. If the ancestors of these were all soft and then same offspring evolved a hard skeleton, the only fossilized animals would be those more recent varieties. Therefore, we expect fossils to appear suddenly in the geologic record and that's one reason groups of animals suddenly appear in the Cambrian Explosion.

There are rare instances in which the soft parts of animals are preserved as fossils. One case is the famous Burgess Shale which is one of the best beds from the Cambrian Era (between 500 million and 600 million years ago) mentioned in this quotation. What must have happened is that the ancestors of these creatures were evolving by the ordinary slow processes of evolution, but they were evolving before the Cambrian when fossilizing conditions were not very good and many of them did not have skeletons anyway. It is probably genuinely true that in the Cambrian there was a very rapid flowering of multicellular life and this may have been when a large number of the great animal phyla did evolve. If they did, their essential divergence during a period of about 10 million years is very fast. However, bearing in mind the Stebbins calculation and the Nilsson calculation, it is actually not all that fast. There is some recent evidence from molecular comparisons among modern animals which suggests that there may not have been a Cambrian explosion at all, anyway. Modern phyla may well have their most recent common ancestors way back in the Precambrian.

As I said, we're actually lucky to have fossils at all. In any case, it is misleading to think that fossils are the most important evidence for evolution. Even if there were not a single fossil anywhere in the earth, the evidence for evolution would still be utterly overwhelming.* We would be in the position of a detective who comes upon a crime after the fact. You can't see the crime being committed because it has already happened. But there is evidence lying all around. To pursue any case, most detectives and most courts of law are happy with 2-3 clues that point in the right direction.

Of course I am not surprised at all that Dawkins would minimize the importance of the fossil record. Surely if it teemed with evidence for his theory, he would feel differently about it.

I am a bit surprised that he thinks the theory of evolution via RM+NS is essentially beyond reproach. I read through his lecture (which I mistakenly referred to as a book earlier) and I looked for this "utterly overwhelming" evidence he speaks of, but did not find it.

From the same lecture:

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These are all domestic dogs (Slide 1) except the top one which is a wolf. The point of it is, as observed by Darwin, how remarkable that we could go by human artificial selection from a wolf ancestor to all these breeds - a Great Dane, a Bulldog, a Whippet, etc. They were all produced by a process analogous to natural selection - artificial selection. Humans did the choosing whereas in natural selection, as you know, it is nature that does the choosing. Nature selects the ones that survive and are good at reproducing, to leave their genes behind. With artificial selection, humans do the choosing of which dogs should breed and with whom they should mate.

These plants (Slide 2) are all members of the same species. They are all descended quite recently from the wild cabbage Brassica olearacea and they are very different cauliflower, brussels sprouts, kale, broccoli, etc. This great variety of vegetables, which look completely different, has been shaped - they have been sculpted - by the process of artificial selection from the same common ancestor.

The problem with Dawkins' logic here is that it doesn't match reality:

(As you and I have discussed before), artificial selection is not "analogous to natural selection", as Dawkins argues. Artificial selection only works by shielding organisms from natural selection.

Throw all domesticated dogs back into the wild and watch as all these breeds go away - to be replaced by mutt dogs which will gradually lose many of their unique, bred-for characteristics and more and more closely resemble the wolf from which they came.

The same goes for these cultivated plants. Throw them back into the wild and eventually they revert back to the original wild cabbage species - all the domesticated varieties would disappear.

These things can be verified in your own back yard.

--------------"If we all worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true is really true, there would be little hope of advance." Orville Wright

"The presence or absence of a creative super-intelligence is unequivocally a scientific question." Richard Dawkins

Throw all domesticated dogs back into the wild and watch as all these breeds go away - to be replaced by mutt dogs which will gradually lose many of their unique, bred-for characteristics and more and more closely resemble the wolf from which they came.

The fact that dogs under artificial selection have one set of characters, and another set of characters when they are feral and subject to a different kind of selective pressure, is not a problem for evolutionary theory. It is, in fact, a prediction of that theory.

Do you have any testable predictions from your theory (whatever it is at the moment) that would lead to a different outcome than that predicted by evolutionary theory?

--------------Flesh of the sky, child of the sky, the mindHas been obligated from the beginningTo create an ordered universeAs the only possible proof of its own inheritance. - Pattiann Rogers

Daniel, it is also not true. the genetic milieu is changed by selection (artificial is just another form, and it's not really artificial is it? unless you are arguing it is sooooopernatcheral).

offspring of different lineages (or hybrids if you will) can have phenotypes that are completely outside the range of variation in the parents. if there is any positive selective pressure on those traits then they will persist. if there is then a mate preference, they will diverge. it is that simple, and 'throwing dogs into the wild and they all turn back into wolves' is just wrong for a litany of reasons. think about why that might be. no way can a chihuaha turn 'back into' a wolf. for one, it never was one.

fancy types of lettuce don't go back to being one single muddy lettuce, there is a quantitative legacy of mutation and selection. same as the dogs. new traits can be formed from recombination during contact between different lineages (See the Helianthus sunflower examples, it blows your contentions out of the water in the first paragraph)

--------------You're obviously illiterate as hell. Peach, bro.-FtK

Finding something hard to believe based on the evidence, is science.-JoeG

Even if there were not a single fossil anywhere in the earth, the evidence for evolution would still be utterly overwhelming.* Richard Dawkins

Of course I am not surprised at all that Dawkins would minimize the importance of the fossil record.

You're quote mining, Daniel, and avoiding the real evidence.

He's not minimizing its importance. He's pointing out that evidence from other sources is much more extensive and complete:

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The evidence comes from comparative studies of modern animals. If you look at the millions of modern species and compare them with each other - looking at the comparative evidence of biochemistry, especially molecular evidence - you get a pattern, an exceedingly significant pattern, whereby some pairs of animals like rats and mice are very similar to each other. Other pairs of animals like rats and squirrels are a bit more different. Pairs like rats and porcupines are a bit more different still in all their characteristics. Others like rats and humans are a bit more different still, and so forth. The pattern that you see is a pattern of cousinship; that is the only way to interpret it. Some are close cousins like rats and mice; others are slightly more distant cousins (rats and porcupines) which means they have a common ancestor that lived a bit longer ago. More distinctly different cousins like rats and humans had a common ancestor who lived a bit longer ago still. Every single fact that you can find about animals is compatible with that pattern.

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Surely if it teemed with evidence for his theory, he would feel differently about it.

He's saying that other sources are more complete and more than sufficient. That's why creationists generally avoid discussing the sequence evidence, and when they do, they grossly misrepresent it.

How many trees have you constructed from sequences (evidence) using tools like CLUSTAL and BLAST, Daniel?

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I am a bit surprised that he thinks the theory of evolution via RM+NS is essentially beyond reproach.

That's because you're afraid of grappling with evidence for yourself. If you any real confidence in your position, you'd be discussing evidence instead of quote mining.

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I read through his lecture (which I mistakenly referred to as a book earlier) and I looked for this "utterly overwhelming" evidence he speaks of, but did not find it.

What part of this don't you understand?

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If you look at the millions of modern species and compare them with each other - looking at the comparative evidence of biochemistry, especially molecular evidence - you get a pattern, an exceedingly significant pattern, whereby some pairs of animals like rats and mice are very similar to each other.

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The same goes for these cultivated plants. Throw them back into the wild and eventually they revert back to the original wild cabbage species - all the domesticated varieties would disappear.

--------------The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

Uf, it seems you are having hard time here. Your arguments refuting Adam Smith's opinions are very weak I would say.

1) If you think that Schindewolf was wrong, do you think the same about Gould and Eldredge? You know their conception of Punctuated Equilibria. Do you really think that Schindewolf was as wrong as was Gould?

Gould 1987:The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persist as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils ….

2) If Dawkins thinks that dogs somehow support evolution in darwinian way, he should show us some speciation. Dogs are only dogs whatever you do with them. You only work with pre-existing variability which are showed up by breeding.

Btw. the great Dawkins seeing the picture from 19 century painted by 17 years old yougster came to this ridiculous conclusion:

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Or a heavyset, thick-coated wolf, strong enough to carry a cask of brandy, that thrives in Alpine passes and might be named after one of them, the St. Bernard?

Bernard has never carried a cask of brandy. It is only in Dawkins imagination that he "is strong enough" to carry it. Maybe he would be surprised if he checked it in reality.

Another Dawkins fantasy - I can discuss it in detail at another thread if you like - is his explanation of origin of mimicry. He often offers only his imagination instead of facts .

--------------I could not answer, but should maintain my ground.-
Charles Darwin

2) If Dawkins thinks that dogs somehow support evolution in darwinian way, he should show us some speciation. Dogs are only dogs whatever you do with them. You only work with pre-existing variability which are showed up by breeding.

It seems obvious that artificial selection pressures have resulted in a wide variation of dog phenotypes in a very short amount of time. Whether or not these are "species" by any rigorous definition is irrelevant. The point is that selection pressures can produce physical variation.

--------------

Quote (afdave @ Oct. 02 2006,18:37)

Many Jews were in comfortable oblivion about Hitler ... until it was too late.Many scientists will persist in comfortable oblivion about their Creator ... until it is too late.

Even if there were not a single fossil anywhere in the earth, the evidence for evolution would still be utterly overwhelming.* Richard Dawkins

Of course I am not surprised at all that Dawkins would minimize the importance of the fossil record.

You're quote mining, Daniel, and avoiding the real evidence.

It wasn't my quote so how could I be "mining" it?

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He's not minimizing its importance. He's pointing out that evidence from other sources is much more extensive and complete:

Quote

The evidence comes from comparative studies of modern animals. If you look at the millions of modern species and compare them with each other - looking at the comparative evidence of biochemistry, especially molecular evidence - you get a pattern, an exceedingly significant pattern, whereby some pairs of animals like rats and mice are very similar to each other. Other pairs of animals like rats and squirrels are a bit more different. Pairs like rats and porcupines are a bit more different still in all their characteristics. Others like rats and humans are a bit more different still, and so forth. The pattern that you see is a pattern of cousinship; that is the only way to interpret it. Some are close cousins like rats and mice; others are slightly more distant cousins (rats and porcupines) which means they have a common ancestor that lived a bit longer ago. More distinctly different cousins like rats and humans had a common ancestor who lived a bit longer ago still. Every single fact that you can find about animals is compatible with that pattern.

Big deal. Things that are alike are built alike - even at the molecular level. No one disputes this. What the molecular evidence shows, however is not always consistent with RM+NS. For instance, Denton points out the "Molecular Equidistance of all Eucaryotic Organisms from Bacteria" (in "Evolution: A Theory In Crisis", Figure 12.2, page 280), which is more consistent with the Schindewolf/Berg/Davison et al hypotheses of prescribed/directed/planned/designed evolution.

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Surely if it teemed with evidence for his theory, he would feel differently about it.

He's saying that other sources are more complete and more than sufficient. That's why creationists generally avoid discussing the sequence evidence, and when they do, they grossly misrepresent it.

How many trees have you constructed from sequences (evidence) using tools like CLUSTAL and BLAST, Daniel?

None. And in answer to your previous question about the primary literature: I read what I can online. I've often searched for articles on google scholar, but most require memberships to read - so I am not nearly as well informed as you I'm sure.

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I am a bit surprised that he thinks the theory of evolution via RM+NS is essentially beyond reproach.

That's because you're afraid of grappling with evidence for yourself. If you any real confidence in your position, you'd be discussing evidence instead of quote mining.

I didn't quote mine. And I'm happy to discuss any evidence you want to discuss. It may take me awhile to understand what you're getting at sometimes and you may have to bring it down to my level, but don't accuse me of not being willing to discuss evidence when you haven't even given me the chance.

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Quote

I read through his lecture (which I mistakenly referred to as a book earlier) and I looked for this "utterly overwhelming" evidence he speaks of, but did not find it.

What part of this don't you understand?

Quote

If you look at the millions of modern species and compare them with each other - looking at the comparative evidence of biochemistry, especially molecular evidence - you get a pattern, an exceedingly significant pattern, whereby some pairs of animals like rats and mice are very similar to each other.

I understand all of it. None of it is inconsistent with Nomogenesis, Orthogenesis, or the PEH.

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The same goes for these cultivated plants. Throw them back into the wild and eventually they revert back to the original wild cabbage species - all the domesticated varieties would disappear.

These things can be verified in your own back yard.

And have you done so?

No, but Berg cites many examples of similar types of experiments. His arguments against evolution via natural selection are very well constructed and empirically based.

--------------"If we all worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true is really true, there would be little hope of advance." Orville Wright

"The presence or absence of a creative super-intelligence is unequivocally a scientific question." Richard Dawkins

Do you mean "archetypes" like he writes on page 411? As he says: "In contrast, we stay with the objective natural data and strive to arrange the morphological steps in the system in their natural sequence." So let's look at fossils that have been discovered since 1950: how about the Therapsid-Mammal transition, are they far enough apart? Try Colbert and Morales (1991) or Strahler(1987). Reptile-Amphibian? Try here. Fish-Amphibian? Try here!

I'm not sure what you're arguing against here. The passage you quoted was from the chapter on taxonomy and he was discussing phylogenetic classification (which he deemed subjective) as opposed to morphological classification (which he called objective).

You seem to be arguing as if he denied common descent or evolution in general. He denied neither. His contention was with the mechanism of evolution.

Schindewolf proposed that evolution proceeded according to patterns. He gave the example of the marsupial and placental wolves. These obviously unrelated animals developed eerily similar features quite independently of each other.

He also proposed that evolution proceeded as if constrained by a goal. He gives the example of the evolution of the one-toed foot on the horse - which began long before the horse moved onto the plains and the one-toed foot became advantageous.

He also proposed that evolution occurred during ontogeny and gave several examples of ammonoid suture and coral septal apparatus evolution to support his views.

Again, I'm not sure what you are arguing against.

--------------"If we all worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true is really true, there would be little hope of advance." Orville Wright

"The presence or absence of a creative super-intelligence is unequivocally a scientific question." Richard Dawkins

2) If Dawkins thinks that dogs somehow support evolution in darwinian way, he should show us some speciation. Dogs are only dogs whatever you do with them. You only work with pre-existing variability which are showed up by breeding.

Martin, You apparently have access to a broad array of scientific journals. You haven't missed the hundreds of speciation cases that have been studied, then published during the last years, have you?

2) If Dawkins thinks that dogs somehow support evolution in darwinian way, he should show us some speciation. Dogs are only dogs whatever you do with them. You only work with pre-existing variability which are showed up by breeding.

Martin, You apparently have access to a broad array of scientific journals. You haven't missed the hundreds of speciation cases that have been studied, then published during the last years, have you?

I have somehow missed any speciation from dogs. Or which ones do you have on mind?

--------------I could not answer, but should maintain my ground.-
Charles Darwin

2) If Dawkins thinks that dogs somehow support evolution in darwinian way, he should show us some speciation. Dogs are only dogs whatever you do with them. You only work with pre-existing variability which are showed up by breeding.

Martin, You apparently have access to a broad array of scientific journals. You haven't missed the hundreds of speciation cases that have been studied, then published during the last years, have you?

I have somehow missed any speciation from dogs. Or which ones do you have on mind?

I'm pretty sure creationists are the only people claiming that there has been massive speciation from dogs over the past few thousand years.

--------------

Quote (afdave @ Oct. 02 2006,18:37)

Many Jews were in comfortable oblivion about Hitler ... until it was too late.Many scientists will persist in comfortable oblivion about their Creator ... until it is too late.

To me it seems at least possible that dog breeders were primarily interesting in getting particular features in their breeds. Obtaining a speciation event was probably not their goal. I wonder if speciation would even be consistent with the usual goals of breeders, since it would limit the possibility of crossing their breed with another in order to import different genes.

The only aspect of "artificial" selection in dogs that's really artificial is the fact that theoretically any breed of canis familiaris can produce viable offspring with any other. We've artficially suppressed speciation.

But how long would it take a population of chihuahuas and a population of great danes to fully speciate in wild conditions?

As a rule, creationists abuse the concept[s] of speciation.Ring Species are illustrative of the complexities that are always ignored in this type of argument.

--------------The is the beauty of being me- anything that any man does I can understand.--Joe G

The only aspect of "artificial" selection in dogs that's really artificial is the fact that theoretically any breed of canis familiaris can produce viable offspring with any other. We've artficially suppressed speciation.

But how long would it take a population of chihuahuas and a population of great danes to fully speciate in wild conditions?

That's an instance of mechanical isolation. They certainly can't mate and could be considered as true species.

2) If Dawkins thinks that dogs somehow support evolution in darwinian way, he should show us some speciation. Dogs are only dogs whatever you do with them. You only work with pre-existing variability which are showed up by breeding.

Martin, You apparently have access to a broad array of scientific journals. You haven't missed the hundreds of speciation cases that have been studied, then published during the last years, have you?

I have somehow missed any speciation from dogs. Or which ones do you have on mind?

It seemed to me you were looking for some speciation event, not especially in dogs.

But you remark was irrelevant. Evolution "in Darwinian way" is not synonymous with speciation.

He's not minimizing its importance. He's pointing out that evidence from other sources is much more extensive and complete:

Quote

The evidence comes from comparative studies of modern animals. If you look at the millions of modern species and compare them with each other - looking at the comparative evidence of biochemistry, especially molecular evidence - you get a pattern, an exceedingly significant pattern, whereby some pairs of animals like rats and mice are very similar to each other. Other pairs of animals like rats and squirrels are a bit more different. Pairs like rats and porcupines are a bit more different still in all their characteristics. Others like rats and humans are a bit more different still, and so forth. The pattern that you see is a pattern of cousinship; that is the only way to interpret it. Some are close cousins like rats and mice; others are slightly more distant cousins (rats and porcupines) which means they have a common ancestor that lived a bit longer ago. More distinctly different cousins like rats and humans had a common ancestor who lived a bit longer ago still. Every single fact that you can find about animals is compatible with that pattern.

Big deal. Things that are alike are built alike - even at the molecular level.

That's not remotely close to what he's saying. He's talking about mathematical analyses of the similarities AND DIFFERENCES. They fit nested hierarchies. The hierarchies of the organisms can be superimposed upon the hierarchies of their components, which are even more complex, because we can see how different proteins are related to each other.

Oh, and Daniel, no set of designed objects has these characteristics, so please save your lying for ignorant lay people.

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No one disputes this.

Which is why you employ it as a straw man.

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What the molecular evidence shows, however is not always consistent with RM+NS.

Obviously, much of it is consistent with drift, which is not RM+NS, and a small subset is consistent with horizontal transfer.

If you had the slightest clue, you'd know that modern evolutionary theory is not limited to RM+NS.

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For instance, Denton points out the "Molecular Equidistance of all Eucaryotic Organisms from Bacteria" (in "Evolution: A Theory In Crisis", Figure 12.2, page 280), which is more consistent with the Schindewolf/Berg/Davison et al hypotheses of prescribed/directed/planned/designed evolution.

No. Denton fundamentally misunderstood evolutionary theory, and has since backtracked on that ignorant claim. MET (particularly drift) predicts that. Denton assumed a ladder, not a bush.

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None.

Why not construct some trees, then, unless you weren't being truthful about your interest in evidence?

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And in answer to your previous question about the primary literature: I read what I can online.

That doesn't answer my question. Have you ever read a paper from the primary literature?

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I've often searched for articles on google scholar, but most require memberships to read - so I am not nearly as well informed as you I'm sure.

So why do you consider your uninformed conclusions to be more correct than mine?

It may take me awhile to understand what you're getting at sometimes and you may have to bring it down to my level, but don't accuse me of not being willing to discuss evidence when you haven't even given me the chance.

Sorry, but you're supposed to familiarize yourself with the evidence before reaching a firm conclusion.

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What part of this don't you understand?

I understand all of it. None of it is inconsistent with Nomogenesis, Orthogenesis, or the PEH.

I don't think you understand it at all, since you blew it off as mere similarity.

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No, but Berg cites many examples of similar types of experiments. His arguments against evolution via natural selection are very well constructed and empirically based.

To know that, you'd have to be familiar with the evidence, not just that someone offered citations. Are you familiar with these data, or are you faking it? Do you realize that science is not about appraising arguments, but about predicting and grappling with the actual evidence, not what anyone says about it?

Big deal. Things that are alike are built alike - even at the molecular level.

If you're going to argue for "common design" as we see you coming, you'll have to explain why closely related species share homologies at synonymous or neutral sites, which have nothing to do with "design".For instance, why do all primates share a non-functional copy of a gene normally involved in the production of vitamin C? And why do the phylogeny of this useless pseudo-gene reflects phylogenies of coding regions?

And also, why are we more genetically close to the coelacanth than it is close to the trout? The irony is that the fossil record, which according to you disproves the ToE, predicted that.

Big deal. Things that are alike are built alike - even at the molecular level.

If you're going to argue for "common design" as we see you coming, you'll have to explain why closely related species share homologies at synonymous or neutral sites, which have nothing to do with "design".

That's what I'm trying to do with the cannabinoid receptor paper.

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For instance, why do all primates share a non-functional copy of a gene normally involved in the production of vitamin C? And why do the phylogeny of this useless pseudo-gene reflects phylogenies of coding regions?

That might be too complex, as well as getting into Daniel's likely misconceptions about pseudogenes and "junk" DNA.

I myself am no scientist. As far as formal training, I'm more than ignorant. What little I know has been self taught.

Full Stop.

Daniel: based upon your own self-description, we need no longer give the slightest attention to your thoughts on evolutionary biology. You don't know shit from Shinola on the topic, by your own admission. Plus your wingtips stink.

Daniel admits abject ignorance of contemporary evolutionary science, yet nevertheless feels qualified to reject a priori the hard won findings of a community of thousands of scientists laboring over decades in an attempt to better understand the history of life on earth. Moreover, he prefers a priori a handful of crackpots and outliers who "work" outside the scientific community and whose ideas have been ridiculed, shunned, and forgotten by that community. In short, although he claims interest in the work of scientists who themselves operate "free of preconceptions," he freely admits being motivated by the biased assumptions and foregone conclusions of science denial. A position that emerged from his admitted ignorance.

Daniel: I now invite you to abandon the pretense of "objective, direct consideration of the evidence, free of preconceptions," to which your own self-descriptive statements (and subsequent posts) utterly give the lie, stop holding forth on a topic of which you are self-admittedly utterly ignorant, and tell us what is motivating your anti-science stance.

What commitments and what community identification account for your stance?

--------------Myth: Something that never was true, and always will be.

"The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you."- David Foster Wallace

"Hereâ€™s a clue. Snarky banalities are not a substitute for saying something intelligent. Write that down."- Barry Arrington

Daniel admits abject ignorance of contemporary evolutionary science, yet nevertheless feels qualified to reject a priori the hard won findings of a community of thousands of scientists laboring over decades in an attempt to better understand the history of life on earth. Moreover, he prefers a priori a handful of crackpots and outliers who "work" outside the scientific community and whose ideas have been ridiculed, shunned, and forgotten by that community. In short, although he claims interest in the work of scientists who themselves operate "free of preconceptions," he freely admits being motivated by the biased assumptions and foregone conclusions of science denial. A position that emerged from his admitted ignorance.

These words remind me how Giordano Bruno was wellcommed in Oxford. Pundits there ridiculed him considering themselves to be brilliant scientists. Giordano Bruno was only a layman who knew nothing about movement of planets in their eyes.

I can see the same is now happening to ideas of Schindewolf, Berg and Davison. Their supporters are ridiculed as well. (But you are too ignorant to adress also entomologist Punnett or Heikertinger, who called your alike "Hypothetiker" and who showed that natural selection play no role in evolution of insect forms and coloration).

But do not be so sure in your convictions. It doesn't mean if you dismiss their ideas that you are right.

You are operating with very funny arguments:we are so many, so we are right.

--------------I could not answer, but should maintain my ground.-
Charles Darwin